From learning to write to writing to write

Abstract

The writing skill is a cognitively complex skill, and it is a problem for many EFL Written Expression students. Writing teachers at the Department of English at the University of Jijel agree that the second year EFL students’ written productions are mundane and prolix. The complexity of the writing skill can be partly attributable to some variables that EFL students have to cognitively master both at the sentence level and beyond the sentence level so as to achieve correct English pieces of writing. Besides, the way the writing skill is taught at the department of English remains debatable as to which method teachers should apply in their classes. It can be hypothesized that students would enjoy writing profusely if teachers used the appropriate approaches in teaching writing and know how to develop their students’ cognitive and metacognitive skills when writing. In other words, if students are to become proficient writers, it is incumbent upon their teachers to lead them from learning to write (learning the fundamentals of writing) to writing to write (enjoying writing and being aware of and motivated to write). As such, this study aims at testing the effects of implementing a well balanced approach to teaching writing and allowing more practice for a better students’ written performance. As a matter of fact, this approach is an eclectic approach to teaching writing, drawing on the product approach, process approach, and genre approach. With that end in view, two questionnaires were designed for both teachers and students and an experiment -conducted over a period of four months in which each second year student was required to write 4 essays. The analysis of the questionnaires has revealed that the writing skill is being taught and approached piecemeal, with less room for practice and insufficient feedback on the part of teachers of writing. The results of the experiment have shown that the students gained in writing proficiency; hence, the results support the hypothesis (H1).